Faced with a budget shortfall now estimated at $1.26 billion, Gov. Terry McAuliffe and General Assembly Republicans are bickering instead over whether the governor proposed to expand Medicaid in the budget he presented legislators on Friday.
McAuliffe did not include $2.4 billion in federal funds that Virginia could use to expand the health care program under the Affordable Care Act or an estimated state general fund savings of $213 million that he said could have helped offset spending cuts.
Citing “a great deal of uncertainty” over the future of the law, the governor told legislators he chose “the fiscally prudent path” by leaving enhanced federal Medicaid funds out of the budget.
